ALAN WAKE SYNOPSIS
HOME ALAN WAKE MAIN STORY Alan Wake is a writer, a writer of crime thrillers to be exact. He and his wife Alice live in New York where they make a comfy living off of Alan's best selling novels and Alice's photography. Everything was fine until writer's block set in about two years prior putting a strain on their professional lives as well as their relationship. They plan a vacation to Bright Falls, Washington in hopes of clearing away the cogs and getting a fresh perspective on things. We join the couple as they arrive in Bright Falls, more specifically we are taken for a spin into a nightmare that Alan is having along the way. He is driving in a strange car to a destination he is not even sure of why he needs to get there when he hits a hitchhiker standing in the road. While inspecting the carnage Alan turns his head for just a bit and when he looks back the hitchhiker is gone. In fear Alan takes off running for a lighthouse in the distance, maybe for help, maybe out of some pre-ordained dream plan but it does not take long for the Hitchhiker to reappear and he is not at all freindly. The Hitchhiker makes chase, ranting about Alan's books and the characters he has created. Alan runs for everything he's worth towards the lighthouse. This is the pre-cursor to the dual reality Alan will find himself in throughout the remainder of the game. At first all seems peaceful as he and Alice ferry into Bright Falls, the scenery is beautiful and Alan is looking forward to exploring this new paradise. Alice is happy as well snapping pictures as fast as she can point the lens while Alan mosies around the boat speaking with other passengers while watching the scenery float by like the wake from the boat itself. The couple is dooped right from the beginning but don't realize it as they retrieve the keys and head off for the cabin at Cauldron Lake. Paradise is soon shattered as the Dark Presence makes it first move following an argument over a typewriter that Alice has brought along. While standing on the bridge from the mainland trying to cool down he hears the screams, Alan rushes back to the cabin but it is too late, Alice is gone. It looks as if she has crashed through the hand rails on the rear deck and fallen into the dark waters of the lake far below. Alan dives in after her but the force of hitting the water knocks him unconscious. Alan awakens a week later (according to dates and times found on posters soon after) in his wrecked car on the side of a mountain. From here on out Alan will find himself in what most times seems like a battle for his very life against shadowy figures resurrected by the Dark Presnece and other times like he is being driven along an unseen path for purposes he does not fully understand. The Darkness wants something and seems at times to have to restrain itself from going to far in its handling of Alan. There are other characters embroiled in the fight for Alan's talents but in the end they too are manipulated by the Dark Presence or gotten rid of alltogether. All Alan wants is to find his way out of this nightmare that he has found himself in and save his wife Alice. Alan has few true allies in the game and most times is completely on his own in dealing with and surviving his dark ordeal. Barry Wheeler eventually shows up from New York, he is Alan's agent and has not come because he wants to help Alan in this struggle (he actually knows nothing of what is going on), he is here to protect his valuable author or, if you prefer, his money. What Barry finds is beyond all imagination and following encounters with the law and events that cannot be explained in any rational manner finds himself as deeply involved as his prized bestseller. The two of them will share a good bit of the coming struggles which takes Alan to several locales such as Elderwood National Park full of beautiful scenery and ghostly danger, The Cauldron Lake Lodge - Dr Emil's psych ward for struggling artists, The Anderson Farm with its Old Gods of Asgard concert stage (the aged rockers Odin and Tor play a pivotal role), the trailer park where Rose lives, the Bright Falls Coal Mine and many other detailed and fascinating places. During this journey Alan is slowly able to piece together what is really happening from various clues and information he finds along the way. Apparently he has written a new book called "Departure" but he does not remember writing it. It seems the Dark Presence is not only causing the pages of this manuscript to come to life but twisting images from Alan's mind and memories into troubling bouts of reality. Some of the characters in Bright Falls are possessed by the Dark Presence while others seem to be oblivious to any strange doings at all. Aside from Barry the only other real help Alan recieves is from the local sheriff Sarah Breaker who also happens to be an accomplished helicopter pilot. Everyone else is either no longer in reality or possessed of their own personal motives. Alan learns that the Dark Presence lives in a dark place in the depths of Cauldron Lake and this is where Alice is being kept. The original occupant of the cabin at Cauldron Lake, Thomas Zane, who once fought the Dark Presence, has been waiting for a new soul to combat the evil forces in the lake and becomes a new ally of Alan's, albeit a spooky one who can be rather cryptic at times. Zane's mistress was lost to the Darkness many years before in much the same way as Alice and is now the face of the Dark Presence. Zane tells Alan that he must re-write the story, that the Darkness has been using Barbara to direct the work of fiction called the "Departure" for its own benefit; namely to escape its prison in the lake and bring its dark soul into the real world. Zane's appearance in the story would lend one to believe that Alan has a shot at survivng his battle with the Dark Presence but Zane is not here, he is communicating from the other side. The story only hints at two souls who have ever survived a confrontation with the Darkness and luckily for Alan they had enough presence of mind at the time to record the most important clue Alan will ever need in one of their songs. This clue will eventually lead Alan to the Bright Falls Power and Light Company and Cynthia Weaver (you've met her before but most likely paid her little attention). Cynthia has been protecting a very special place called the Well Lit Room that holds a very special item which true to Alan Wake form has been talked about previously but in a different setting under different circumstances. It is this item, called "the clicker", that will be essential in Alan's quest to stop the darkness and rescue his lost wife Alice. With clicker in hand Alan returns to Cauldron Lake to confront the Dark Presence once and for all. He succesfully uses the weapon hidden by Zane to defeat Barbara and therefor the Darkness' current hold on this reality but Alice is not restored to the present. Alan realizes that a sacrifice must be made in order to maintain a delicate balance between good and evil and throws himself into the lake. Alice is deposited on the shores of the lake at the spot where the original bridge would have crossed to the cabin but Alan is not there to comfort and protect her. Alan has traded his own freedom for that of Alice's and is now trapped deep below the waters of Cauldron Lake in the Dark Place. He quickly sets to work at finishing the "Departure", only the escape he is writing now is his own. THE SIGNAL Picking up where the main game left off Alan finds himself in a twisted version of Bright Falls. Zane is telling Alan to follow a signal that will help him find his way out of the Dark Place he is trapped in. The que to follow a signal here is a little vague but it is actually tied to the phone booths Alan will find in various locations. There is also a ghostly version of Al appearing here and there trying to aid Alan in his quest to follow the signal but in reality it all seems as confusing as the story itself is meant to be and Alan makes comment of this on several occasions. After many battles with the Taken, including a wild version of the church basement where he can use the furnaces that now line the room to his advantage, Alan finds himself in a dream version of his old apartment. Here Zane tells Alan that all of this is being created in Alan's tormented mind and he must get to the cabin to confront himself in order to put an end to it all. Alan eventually finds himself in a sort of warehouse type building confronted with a monstrosity made up of many TV screens showing images of the irrational Alan trying to kill him. Upon defeating this horror Alan wakes up in the cabin once again, still trapped in the Dark Place. THE WRITER Alan is still trapped in the Dark Place, having survived only half of the journey to the cabin which holds Alan's irrational self. Zane tells Alan that he must find his way to the lighthouse for it is the only way to access the cabin and end the torment. This is not an easy task as the landscape is full of new surprises, never behaving as it should, and Alan must use words to help complete the journey. Towards the last leg of this amazing trip things start to become even more difficult. The light, what little there is, becomes even dimmer. Alan is surrounded in nearly pitch darkness while trying to locate the path to the lighthouse and it does not help that Taken materialize repeatedly to thwart his progression. The one saving factor here is that the lighthouse is spinning its lantern which catches any Taken in its beam as it makes its rounds, giving Alan those precious few seconds he needs to regain his focus on the task at hand. Upon making the lighthouse Alan is transported to a twisted version of the bridge to Bird Island which is really just a kind of Alice in Wonderland walk across the lake to Bird Leg Cabin. Once at the cabin Alan will be forced into a tough fight with Emil Hartman, The Anderson Brothers and his long time friend Al. Once he has won these battles Alan can enter the cabin where he finds his irrational self writhing on the floor. One touch combines the two tortured souls and Alan sets down to write a new story, this one is called "The Return". He is still trapped in the Dark Place but determined to keep his sanity and write himself out of this nightmare.